Starting the album off, we have Acceleration (which was released as a TSUTAYA rental single) but I didn’t listen to that so this is the first time I’m hearing the song. Things are what I was expecting it to be since there’s a lot of the same things that were in “Just Awake”. So is singing in his auto-tune and Minami is doing the screaming of the song and it’s interesting to listen to them mesh. I definitely enjoyed the energy of the song and there’s parts where So and Minami doing scream together too…it’s wild. Though I don’t exactly get the DIR EN GREY-inspired ending….that came out of nowhere >.>

2. Scream Hard as You Can

As the title hints at, there’s a lot of screaming going in the song. I’m liking that the band switched from the speed techno to more of a hard rock setting which is awesome. That is until the midway point when the switches from it’s setting to more of a techno-based sound…it’s still screaming in eardrums and it’s kind of cool? I love the synths to be honest. Interesting song overall!

3. Crossover

I have to say at this point of the album, I’m kind of wishing this album came with an instrumental CD because the music is great and hard-hitting but Crossover is definitely DIR EN GREY-inspired. I do like the synth melody though and the melody in the end being soooo hard.

4. How Old You are Never Forget Your Dream

At this point I was wondering when things will slightly calm down and the fourth track seems to be that song. I for some reason did really enjoy this song for some reason. All the melodies seem to be concrete, but then Minami comes in and does is yelling in the lightest part of the song which came out of nowhere and surprised me. However, this song is strong since the piano plays a big part and everything fits together.

5. Interlude I

I’m surprised the band held to actually have interludes. The first of them is quite awesome. It starts out with a beautiful piano melody that goes for shortly and then the second part enters and the tune is more playful and latin-influenced which surprised me. After a drum solo, the interlude transitions into this electro arrangement and I LOVED THE SHIT OUT OF THAT. Now this is how you do an interlude!

6. Just Awake

As the only single released for the album, Just Awake actually grew on me since I reviewed said single. I mean it’s a bit like the stuff before the interlude which isn’t new to me but for some reason the song just grew on me. So is of course singing mostly and doing some screaming as well (I can tell because he has the higher pitch between him and Minami). I still do feel the jazzy piano passage was very WTF but this song is getting better with each listen.

7. Defeat and Beat

Moving to Defeat and Beat we get another “Scream Hard as You Can” tunes where most of the song is filled with So’s and Minami’s screaming and growling. Add in a kind of rapping section and you basically get this song which is a song I’m unsurprised at my dislike at. It really didn’t stick to me at all and I think this could be the worst on the album.

8. In the End, the Choice is All Yours

On the next track, I thought it was going to be a typical rock track, but once the 8bit sounds jump in, it really takes on a new life. There;s some interesting things going on, that I can admit and it’s still a powerful song to listen too but I think they utilized the screaming to a better degree than some of the other tracks. Like “Just Awake” however, they include a jazzy piano WTF passage and ruined the flow for me. It’s still a good track though otherwise.

9. Ley-Line

I thought I had hope for Ley-Line because they were taking it a bit more towards the electronica side of their sound? I love that this song is more dependent on that style since it’s a lot catchier and makes me kind pass over the screamo parts more smoothly. It’s definitely one of the more memorable songs on the album.

10. Interlude II

Oh hey another interlude! It starts with a beat and rain falling but that fades out and is replaced with this strange Skrillex-like shuffle with the cut n’ paste vocals, then it moves into the grandiose strings section which was awesomely done and then seems like it restarts again but this time leads into a electro section instead of the strings. Odd but I liked the other interlude better to be honest.

11. Don’t Suffer Alone

Closing the album out, Don’t Suffer Alone sounds pretty progressive and has a cool opening that’s for sure. Now I’m clearly hearing English through the auto-tune from So which is pretty cool. I was really impressed with the band dealing with the song because it changed a lot and they did the changes so effortlessly. Cool track!

Tracks Recommended

How Old You are Never Forget Your Dream

Just Awake

Interlude I

Ley-Line

Song of Avoidance

Defeat and Beat

It’s really hard to efficiently tell where I stand with them. The band to me sound like DIR EN GREY but at the same time unique to the Japanese music world because they added all this electronica to their hard metal sound to get this collision of two worlds. All That We Have Now might not be to everyone’s tastes which I can understand since honestly, they are a tough group to deal with. I enjoyed some of the songs but kind of loathed others because they did depend a lot of the screaming from So and Minami (which BTW, at this rate, they’ll end up getting polyps). All in all, not bad…but their style can get drab if they continue the same way.